|
POLITICAL SITUATION IN KYRGYZSTAN
ARKADY DUBNOV,
expert of the Carnegie Moscow Center
POLITICAL AMBITIONS OF KYRGYZ PRIME-MINISTER FELIX KULOV ARE GETTING CLEARER
The approval of Felix Kulov as the Prime-Minister of the Republic of Kyrgyzstan by the Kyrgyz Parliament on September 1, 2005 is a very significant event in the Kyrgyz politics. On the one hand, it is the fulfillment by a new President Kurmanbek Bakiyev of his promise which used to be the main condition of the signed with Kulov in the middle of May, 2005 memorandum on creation of the election alliance between the two politicians. In case he would be elected President, Bakiyev promised to put Kulov in nomination for the post of Prime-Minister.
On the other hand, it illustrates Kulov’s skillful command of political tools that allowed him to avoid the situations that could prompt Kurmanbek Bakiyev to disengage oneself from the “alliance” memorandum. This Felix Kulov’s particular cautiousness should be mentioned since Kurmanbek Bakiyev’s team, that includes the adherents mainly from the South clans of Kyrgyzstan, tried to resist the appointment of Felix Kulov as Prime-Minister till the very payoff.
Now that Felix Kulov has got the confidence vote in the Parliament, he seems to be ready to start his independent and a very intense political gamble in order to grasp significant levers of power in the country. If to follow the letter and intent of the “alliance” memorandum, the Prime-Minister has all the grounds to do that. The memorandum specifies that if Felix Kulov for some reason resigns from the post of Prime-Minister, President Kurmanbek Bakiyev would also have to leave his office. For all the evident unconstitutionality of this provision (Kyrgyz Prosecutor General Azimbek Beknazarov, who criticized the memorandum from the very beginning, permanently reminds about that), to reject the memorandum conditions today means to expose the country to a new crisis, which may cause the split between the North and the South of Kyrgyzstan. The North clans who back up Felix Kulov will never put up with the memorandum’s disruption.
The further developments in Kyrgyzstan will depend on the course of the struggle between Felix Kulov and Kurmanbek Bakiyev for the influence in the Parliament where the Premier-Minister enjoys more support. It was Kulov who saved the current Parliament from being dissolved in the due course of the events of March 24, 2005. Let us remind that the events, after which ex-president Askar Akayev fled from the country and the opposition headed by Kurmanbek Bakiyev came to power, had resulted from the vote fraud during the Kyrgyz parliamentary elections of February-March 2005. The logical outcome from this situation implied the declaration of the elections to be invalid and the dissolution of the Parliament.
Presently, the Parliament that comprises a lot of close to Akayev businessmen, is interested in getting the control over the formation of those governmental agencies that will be responsible for economic and financial policies and financial flows. This is exactly those areas of focus, which according to the memorandum fall into the jurisdiction of Felix Kulov. Therefore, Felix Kulov has the preconditions to find the mutually profitable compromises with the Parliament, and that will enable him to place pressure upon the President in some issues including those of the appointment of his adherents to the Government. Felix Kulov have already stated that he “might have clashes with the President over the personnel affairs” right after his approval as Prime-Minister by the Parliament. This means that Felix Kulov has shown his ambitions in the struggle for power.
We should note that the parliamentary support can play a decisive role in the preparation of the amendments to the Constitution of Kyrgyzstan on altering the political system. The amendments would impose the country’s transition from the presidential-parliamentary Republic to the parliamentary-presidential Republic, i. e. the transition to the system where the Prime-Minister comes to be a kingpin.
|
